New Insights Into the Search for Life on Mars Cesare Guaita
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Chapter New Insights into the Search for Life on Mars Cesare Guaita Abstract The discovery by the Lander Phoenix (summer 2008) that the Mars polar soil is rich of perchloric acid salts (Na, Mg, Ca perchlorate) strongly could change the 14 interpretation of the Martian experiment of CO2 release (LR, Labeled release experiment), performed in 70’s by both Viking Landers. The LR experiment gave substantially positive results but, at that time, possibility of Martian bacteria was ruled out because the CGMS instruments on board of both Vikings didn’t detect any trace of complex organic molecules. But Martian organics exist and were found in fair quantities by Curiosity, landed inside the Gale crater on 2012. So it is likely that Viking CGMS, working at about 500°C, could not see any organic substances (natural or bacterial) because, at that temperature, perchlorates decompose, releas- ing Oxygen that destroyed organics BEFORE their detection. In any case, the dis- covery of keragenic compounds by Curiosity, could also be indication of a presence of archea bacteria in the distant past of Mars, when the atmosphere of the Red Planet was wetter and denser than now. Keywords: Mars, organic substances, perchlorate, archea bacteria 1. Introduction: from Schiaparelli to Mariner 9 Before the space age, the best Mars observations were performed during the so called oppositions [1]. The distance between the orbits of Earth and Mars varies considerably, largely due to the comparatively large eccentricity of Mars’s orbit. Every 780 days on average the Earth overtakes Mars and when, as seen from the Earth, Mars and the Sun are aligned, Mars is said to be in opposition. The opposition distance of Mars from the Earth varies considerably, depending on where Mars and the Earth are in their orbits at opposition. If Mars is near its closest to the Sun (perihelion) the distance is comparatively small, and the opposition is called favourable. Unfavourable oppositions are with Mars near aphelion. The opposition distance varies from 55.7–101 million km, and the corresponding angular diameter of Mars varies from 25.1–13.8 arcsec. Favourable oppositions occur roughly every 15 years. The first person to draw a map of Mars that displayed terrain features was the Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens (Figure 1). On November 28, 1659 he made an illustration of Mars that showed the distinct dark region now known as Syrtis Major Planum, and possibly one of the polar ice caps. The same year, he succeeded in measuring the rotation period of the planet, giving it as approximately 24 hours. 1 Solar System Planets and Exoplanets Figure 1. Syrtis Major, sketched by Christiaan Huygens in 1659. North is at the top. In 1666, Cassini detected several distinct dark spots on Mars, and from observ- ing these ascertained that the planet had a rotation on its axis in about 24 hours 40 minutes. In the oppositions of 1777, 1779, 1781, and 1783, Sir William Herschel determined that the axis of Mars was inclined of about 25° to the plane of its orbit (so having seasons) and measured its polar and equatorial diameters. He showed also that the white spots which formed round the poles of the planet, increased with the approach of winter, and diminished with the approach of summer. In the oppositions of 1830, 1832, and 1837, Beer and Mädler, observing with a telescope of 4 inches aperture, made a series of drawings from which they were able to construct a chart of the entire globe of Mars. The features which they then drew have been recognised at every succeeding opposition, and some of them can be identified in the rough sketches of Sir William Herschel, and even in those of the year 1666, made by Hooke and Cassini. The surface of Mars therefore possesses permanent features. In the 1800s, observatories with larger and larger telescopes were built around the world. A particularly favorable perihelic opposition occurred in 1877 (Mars approcing to within 56 million km on September 5, in Aquarius) [2]. On August 11, 1877 the American astronomer Asaph Hall discovered the two moons of Mars, Phobos and Deimos, using a 660 mm (26 in) telescope at the U.S. Naval Observatory. In the fall of October 1877, Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli (1835–1910), scrutinised Mars visually at the Brera Observatory in Milan, where he was director 0 (Figure 2). He used a 8 (21.8 cm, f/14.5) aperture Mertz refractor (magnifying power of 322x), that was installed here in 1865. He named the Martian “seas” and “continents” (dark and light areas) with names from historic and mythological sources [3]. But he is best remembered for about 40 fine lines that he drew crossing the bright red areas, canali as he called them. Canali means channels, but it was mistranslated into “canals” implying intelligent life on Mars (Figure 3). Because of the then recent completion of the Suez Canal in 1869 (the engineer- ing wonder of the era), the misinterpretation was taken to mean that large-scale artificial structures had been discovered on Mars. The importance of canals for worldwide commerce at that time without a doubt influenced the popular interest in “canals” on Mars. 2 New Insights into the Search for Life on Mars DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.97176 Figure 2. Original drawings of Mars, made by G.V. Schiaparelli during the 1877 opposition. Figure 3. This drawing of the two hemispheres of Mars was made by the Italian astronomer G.V. Schiaparelli (1835– 1910) between the years 1877 and 1888. He named the ‘seas’ and ‘continents’ of Mars, and called the straight surface features channels (mistranslated as canals). Starting from 1886, Brera was equipped by a larger new instrument, a 160 (48.7 cm, f/14.3) Mertz-Repsold refractor. Schiaparelli used it, during a couple of following Mars oppositions (1992–1994), to confirm not only the Martian canals but also some duplications of them! In 1894, Percival Lowel, a member of a rich family from Boston, decided to become a planetary astronomer after reading ‘The Planet Mars’ a famous book of Camille Flammarion. He made his first observations of Mars from a private obser- vatory that he built in Flagstaff, Arizona (Lowell Observatory). He was convinced that the canals were real and ultimately mapped hundreds of them (Figure 4). Lowell believed that the straight lines were artificial canals created by intelligent Martians and were built to carry water from the polar caps to the equatorial regions. In 1895, he published his first book on Mars with many illustrations and, over the next two decades, published two more popular books advancing his ideas. 3 Solar System Planets and Exoplanets Figure 4. Mars in 1905, drawn by Percival Lowell. Note the canals. Note also the south polar hood of cloud (at the top). Lowell’s theories influenced the young English writer H.G. Wells, who in 1898 published The War of the Worlds. In this novel, Wells created an invasion of Earth by deadly aliens from Mars and launched a whole new genre of alien science fiction. On Halloween in 1938, Orson Welles and The Mercury Theater on the Air broadcast a radio version of The War of the Worlds. The story, presented as a series of “live” news bulletins, panicked thousands of listeners who believed that America was being attacked by hostile Martians. In the 1953, the story of The War of the Worlds of H. G. Wells was adapted in a famous American science fiction film from Paramount Pictures, produced by George Pal and directed by Byron Haskin. Earth was suddenly and unexpectedly invaded by Martians. Many of the major world capitals were destroyed by the Martians, being Martians impervious to all humanity’s weapons (enclosed an atomic bomb!) . But, after all that men could do had failed, the Martians were destroyed by terrestrial bacteria to which only mankind have long since become immune. The real origin of the Mars canals was revealed by another Italian astronomer, Vincenzo Cerulli (1859–1927), founder in 1890 of the Astronomical Observatory in Teramo (in the Abruzzo region), equipped by a Cook Refractor of 40 cm. Starting from 1897, he gave a convincing explanation, still generally accepted. He suggested that the lines were a sort of optical illusion, created by the human brain that “needs” to interpret even vague and indistinct images with familiar shapes. Therefore, poor quality images, such as those that low quality telescopes would provide, would be interpreted as structured shapes, for example connecting individual roughly aligned “dots” into straight lines. This has been demonstrated by many laboratory and field experiments. During the great opposition of 1909, on the night of September 2020, thanks to exceptional seeing conditions, Eugène M. Antoniadi (1870–1944), one of the most skilled observer of his time, using the new big 83 cm reflector of Meudon observa- tory, gives some exquisite drawings of Mars, in which all “canals” having some feedback in the past vanished (Figure 5). On 15 July 1965 the NASA spacecraft Mariner 4 flew past Mars, at a minimum distance of only 9800 km. This first Mars flyby gave a major negative surprise: all 22 of the images sent to Earth showed a cratered landscape more akin to the Moon (Figure 6). The heavily cratered (and hence ancient) surfaces indicate lack of 4 New Insights into the Search for Life on Mars DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.97176 Figure 5. In 1909, E.M. Antoniadi got the chance to use the great 33″ refracting telescope at Meudon, on the outskirts of Paris, and on the first night, Sep.